The Ninth Circuit
has decided that the Pledge of Allegiance is unconstitutional. Their
reasoning is absurd and follows the line of reasoning that would
give more legal support for pot than for freedom of
religion.

Special In Dissent Supplement: Are You Irritated
Yet?Brian S. WiseThursday, 27 June 2002

“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the
truth, so help you God?” It was at this exact moment Marlon Brando, as he
was being sworn in as a witness at Christian Brando’s trial, stated that
he would not, as a matter of fact, swear to tell the truth before God, and
asked to take an atheist-appropriate oath. Mr. Brando was quickly given
the alternate oath, was sworn in, and things progressed as normal. No
great fuss or bother; a particular case was made and accepted by a court
of law, his rights as a free thinking, autonomous human being were
honored, and life continued. In regards to yesterday’s Pledge of
Allegiance decision, one wonders why, at the very beginning, one
autonomous person couldn’t have gone to another and asked that his rights,
in the name of his daughter, be respected.

Actually, what one wonders is, “Does the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals
deliberately hand down certain verdicts just to see how long it takes
before they’re overturned?” Certainly seems that way; all Wednesday’s
ruling did was open those proverbial and oft mentioned floodgates. The
majority of America’s Right-wing immediately melted down, and politicians
of all stripes found benefit in thumping their chests as a symbolic
thumbing of the nose, in hopes it would help their parties in a pivotal
election year. Not necessarily inappropriate actions; there’s rarely any
genuine harm that can be done to those who choose the correct side in a
no-brainer.

Every television news and / or analysis program yesterday showed the
following graphic, at least once: “Michael Newdow, atheist,” so his
position on the matter could be immediately known. A basic point of
contention seemed to be, Wouldn’t you have to be an atheist to oppose the
Pledge of Allegiance? Well, no; his point – that his daughter was damaged
because she was forced to recite the pledge with her class, a problem
because of the words “under God” – is shaky, but legitimate. Mr. Newdow is
as free to raise his daughter as is a Christian, and therefore has the
same right to oppose public institutions as any other tax paying citizen.
And had this not been taken to an illogical extreme (i.e., court),
reasonable minds could have concluded Mr. Newdow was acting within the
boundaries afforded any parent, had they ever heard of the case at
all.

Let’s not fill ourselves so full of righteous indignation we confuse or
forget an important point: divided into halves, the case is all at once
completely understandable and silly. The first half rightly suggests a
parent is able to decide (and should, according to his beliefs) what his
child should be subjected to; the second half rather comically suggests
that freedom to choose mysteriously ends when one steps into a public
school. Why couldn’t an atheist simply teach his child to utter “one
nation, not under God” under his breath at the critical moment? Because
exercising his parental freedoms wasn’t the point.

If you found yourself wondering, as I did, why every piece of interview
footage featuring Michael Newdow was in front of a different background –
or how he became so polished an interview in such a short amount of time –
it’s because this crusade against God has been long and continuous,
contradicting the image of a single concerned atheist striking out against
the majority. Before this case (or was it during?), Mr. Newdow had gone to
federal court and failed in an attempt to force President Bush to stop
mentioning religion at public occasions; his was not a random concern, it
was a systematic struggle, part of which he finally won yesterday.

One cannot, and shouldn’t, express any palpable concern over such a
ruling, at least not this one. The speed with which we will see a (very
public) reversal will be amazing, at least when considered in judicial
terms. That leaves us time to take up the old complaints against the Ninth
Circuit, namely its propensity for awful decision making. Last month,
notes today’s Wall Street Journal (page A20), the Ninth Circuit
ruled “Rastafarians could smoke marijuana on federal lands because pot is
sacred to their religion.”

Ah-ha. So at least the distinction is finally made, and carefully:
There must be a separation of Church and State, and therefore of religion
and publicly funded or owned property, unless the religion is an organized
joke and pot is involved. (That seems about right; pot has always meant
more to the Left than God.) Are you irritated yet? Wait; first read this,
from the majority opinion by Alfred Goodwin, the 80-year-old Nixon
appointee: “A profession that we are a nation ‘under God’ is identical,
for Establishment Clause purposes, to a profession that we are a nation
‘under Jesus,’ a nation ‘under Vishnu,’ a nation ‘under Zeus,’ or a nation
‘under no god.’” (That sound you hear is Judge Goodwin’s career coming to
an end; I had an 80-year-old great- grandfather once … we wouldn’t let him
touch the remote control, let alone decide a court case.)

The disagreement here isn’t religious, just visceral; any regular
reader of this column is well aware of the fact this columnist has never,
ever been a friend to organized religion, or of those who take it too
seriously. But come on. Some years ago there was a slight to-do over a
first grade girl who, when it came to that moment in the Pledge of
Allegiance, simply kept her mouth shut and didn’t say “under God.” That,
at least, was dignified. Michael Newdow, as well as the Ninth Circuit
Court of Appeals, would do well to learn from that previous and proud
display of dignity.